


Ordinary

by a_t_rain



Category: Vorkosigan Saga - Lois McMaster Bujold
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-09
Updated: 2016-04-09
Packaged: 2018-06-01 03:17:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6498709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_t_rain/pseuds/a_t_rain
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Topaz and Pearl try out being ordinary.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ordinary

**Author's Note:**

> Because somewhere in the process of writing [On a Cold Planet](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6112777/chapters/14010976), I decided that Topaz really needed a story of her own. For Rish's take on the same episode, see [Loyalty](http://archiveofourown.org/works/4314537).

“How do I look?” asked Pearl, dusting some rouge over the heavy coating of face powder.

“Perfectly fine,” said Topaz. “Ordinary. Well, heavily-made-up ordinary, but on some planets that’s the fashion.” She rubbed on some more liquid tanner, enough to disguise the telltale gold of her veins; _that_ , fortunately, was the fashion too, at least among spacers who wanted to mimic the downside look.

“It feels funny. Like I’m a cake with a layer of frosting on my face.” The Jewels did not usually wear makeup, even for performances.

“You’ll get used to it. And it means we can go out, now.” Their cabin, chosen for economy, was cramped, and they would need to go out in public once they reached the jump-station where they were to change ships, anyway. And, well, they couldn’t hide away for the rest of their _lives_.

Pearl studied the way they looked in the mirror. “We can’t be sisters any more, I don’t think.”

“No,” said Topaz, trying not to think about how _empty_ it would feel not to have sisters. “But we can be friends. What do you say to being off-planet exchange students, headed for Pidge’s university?”

“Wouldn’t we have a bodyguard with us? Pidge and Star always do when they travel.” Their designated handler had been left behind in all of the confusion.

“No, that’s just because they’re the Baron’s daughters. Ordinary students don’t. They travel by themselves all the time.” To be sure, Topaz’s knowledge of what ordinary students did had mostly been gleaned from novels, because there were no real universities on Jackson’s Whole, and there had never been any thought of the Jewels going away to study. It didn’t mean that the Baron and Baronne loved them any less – there had never been any thought of Erik going away, either – but Topaz wondered, sometimes, if she might have liked it. She was fairly sure she was the only one of her sisters who ever thought about that sort of thing. She couldn’t imagine either Ruby or Rish parting from the Baronne by choice, and Pearl and Em definitely weren’t _studious_.

Pearl turned back to the mirror and began fussing with eye makeup, trying to cover up the telltale silver of her lashes and brows. Topaz decided hers were all right as they were, and began looking up Pidge’s university on the little comconsole in their cabin; if that was going to be their cover story, they had better know something about it.

Maybe it would need to be more than a cover story. If the former Baronet Cordonah _succeeded_ in his takeover bid – well, they might not be going home.

The performing arts department looked promising, Topaz thought, but when she floated the idea, Pearl glanced briefly at the screen and snorted. “What could they teach us about dance that we don’t already know?”

“It doesn’t have to be dance. Look, _bachelor of fine arts, design and costuming emphasis_ ... I could do that.” Topaz had been designing the Jewels’ costumes for several years, with less and less input from the Baronne, but she had been entirely self-taught; it would be nice to learn from experts.

“How do you think you’d pay for it?”

“I bet we could get scholarships once they see what we can do.”

“ _You_ can. I’ve had enough of school.”

“We have to do _something_.” Topaz contemplated life as not-one-of-the-Baronne’s-Jewels; perhaps a very long life, given their Cetagandan ancestry. They would need to figure out something to _do_ with themselves. “What do you want to do?”

“I want to go home.”

“I know. We all do. But we can’t do that right now, so what’s second-best?”

“There isn’t any second-best,” said Pearl firmly. That was one of the Baronne’s sayings, and she could deliver it in perfect imitation of their mother. “There’s only _the_ best, and that’s what we’re going to have.”

Topaz was not sure this was a practical approach to life if your parents were no longer heirs to a Great House; but this was no time to argue the point with Pearl. She turned back to the comconsole, wondering if she would have the courage to enroll in a design class by herself. She had never done anything by herself. Maybe Pidge could be talked into taking it as an elective. It wouldn’t be quite the same, since Pidge wasn’t one of _them_ , but it would be company.

But she wouldn’t be able to talk Pidge into taking on an entire _second degree program_ , so sooner or later she would have to start taking courses by herself. She tried to imagine what it would be like, torn between apprehension and liberation.

Pearl’s voice cut into her thoughts. “Do you want to go and get a drink?”

“All right.” They ought to be saving their money, Topaz knew, but one drink couldn’t cost enough to make a difference. Besides, Rish wasn’t there to nag them about it.

* * *

Topaz sidled up to the ship’s lounge bar and then hesitated, unsure how to get the bartender’s attention or whether they were even old enough to drink legally on a Vervani shuttle. That was one of the many things she hadn’t had to _think_ about at home. Pearl, however, simply flirted with the bartender until he was too dazzled to ask them for proof of age, and obtained a couple of fancy frozen drinks with glow-straws in them.

Topaz selected an inconspicuous corner table and positioned herself against the wall so she could watch people. She’d never been in a real, open-to-the-public bar before, although she knew they _existed_ on Jackson’s Whole. Dada still went into them occasionally, accompanied by a single plainclothes bodyguard, even though he was the Baron now. “Sometimes it is important to be seen to be a man like other men,” he explained.

She and Pearl, of course, were designed _not_ to be seen as people like other people; but now, with their hair combed forward over their ears and a bit of cosmetic assistance, they could pass. Nobody seemed to be staring at them, except in the generic way that people usually stared at attractive women. Topaz pretended not to notice, but Pearl stared back, fluttering her eyelashes a little and seeming to enjoy the attention. Topaz considered scolding her – because Ruby wasn’t there to do it, and because they really _ought_ not to be drawing attention from outsiders – but decided to let it slide. If Pearl wanted to flirt with strange boys in bars for once, the way other girls surely did, what was the harm? This was their big chance to try out _ordinary_.

The bar had picture windows through which they could see the surface of Jackson’s Whole, blue and white and dazzling. They were farther away from home than Topaz had ever been before, well past the low orbit of Cordonah Station. She thought about what it would be like to go farther and farther still, into the black reaches of space, and then watch a new and unexplored planet come into view. (New for _her_ , anyway.) It was _not_ that she wanted things to go badly at home – but a tiny part of her did hope it wouldn’t be over too soon, that they would have a chance to see a bit of the place and have a proper visit with Pidge before it was time to go home.

Pearl slurped up the last of the bright red slush in her glass. “Do you want another drink? I bet I could get those guys over there to do the buying.”

Topaz shook her head. “Better not. They’ll want to talk to us and ask questions, and anyway, we should get some sleep since we’re going to be docking at the jump-station in the middle of the night.”

“Night- _cycle_. It’s all arbitrary, out here.”

“Whatever. I’m tired.”

* * *

“Pazzy?” said Pearl as they were undressing for bed.

Topaz turned, startled at the sound of her childhood nickname; no one had called her that since her eighteenth birthday, more than two years ago now. The Baronne liked her grown daughters to be dignified. Star and Pidge cheerfully ignored their mother’s preferences, but Topaz, of course, had wanted to please her. _The Baronne isn’t here_ , she realized. _We don’t have to do exactly what she would like._ And sooner or later, she would be too far away, or too long ago, for her created children to know exactly what she would like.

“What?”

“Do you think the Baronet is telling the truth?”

“He isn’t the Baronet any more. Erik and Amiri are.” (If things were going well. If they weren’t – well, the old Baron’s son might very well be the new Baron, by now.)

“You know who I mean.”

“No, of course he isn’t telling the truth. The old Baron was in his right mind, and the will definitely isn’t a forgery. We all heard him name Mama and Dada his heirs.”

“I mean, about ... the other thing.”

_The other thing_ meant whether the old Baron’s faithful caregivers and heirs, the two people in the galaxy whom he absolutely trusted, had arranged for him to die during his brain-transplant surgery.

“Does it make a difference?” said Topaz. “I mean, he was very old. He couldn’t have lived much longer in his own body.”

“No,” said Pearl. “I guess not. Anyway, the Baronne wouldn’t do anything really _wrong_.”

Topaz wondered if that was true; and then she wondered whether they would even know if the Baronne had done anything really wrong, conditioned as they were to think everything the Baronne did was right. Then she wondered what she would think about the world if she had never had any loyalty conditioning, and whether she would eventually find out if they ended up staying on Pidge’s planet and never saw their parents again.

Pidge had written that her pre-law program required them to study philosophy: ethics, and something called _epistemology_ , which Pidge had explained as _how do we know what we know?_ – a phrase that made Topaz feel a little dizzy when she thought about the implications. She wondered whether she would like to take a philosophy course, or whether it would feel too much like staring into a black hole.

She wondered.

* * *

Topaz’s alarm went off a few hours later; she shook Pearl until her sister finally stopped trying to bury her head under the covers, and then there was a flurry of dressing and packing and re-applying of makeup before they docked. They had only a few hours to make their connection, and then they would leave the Jackson’s Whole system behind.

But when they stepped off the ship at the jump-station, the first thing they saw was dear old faithful Seppe, who said, “Thank God,” and pulled them both into a fierce embrace.

“What’s happened?” asked Pearl, her voice shaking.

“Nothing’s happened. Everything’s fine. I’ve come to take you home.”

_Home_ meant seeing their parents and their brothers and sisters again, everyone safe and well and in one place. It meant dancing, and it meant knowing that they were still the Baron’s children and could have anything they wanted. It was good news, the best news that could be. But Topaz took a last look around at the bustle of the space station – ordinary people bound for other places, vid screens showing departures for planets she would never see, and some she had never even heard of. A tiny, disloyal part of her wished that Seppe hadn’t found them so _quickly_.

She turned, and followed him to the ship that would carry them home.


End file.
